Shuttered Windows
by EFAW
Summary: There's a precedent for Travis's window-crawling habits. Five windows that became all too familiar, and one that was brand new. AU. Oneshot. Backstory. 5 1.


**Summary:** There's a precedent for Travis's window-crawling habits. Five windows that became all too familiar, and one that was brand new. AU. Oneshot. 5+1.

 **Warnings:** Backstory. Several counts of breaking and entering. Or exiting through windows. Some alcohol and drunkenness. Some swearing. Travis really needs to work on this whole 'door' thing.

 **Disclaimer:** I neither own nor am affiliated with Common Law in any way.

 **This story is a prequel fic to the Windows series ('Locked Windows' and 'Open Windows'), with the last section leading directly to the beginning of 'Locked Windows'. If you haven't read the first two fics in this series, I would recommend you do so now.**

 **OOOO**

 **Shuttered Windows**

" _Don't waste a minute not being happy. If one window closes, run to the next window—or break down a door."_

— _Brooke Shields_

 **XXXX**

1.

He ends up screaming at his foster father after dinner. It's not a fight; that would imply it's a two-sided confrontation, and it isn't. It's just Travis screaming until he's out of breath while Andre stands there. Andre, who has had more than enough experience dealing with irrational hormonal teenagers, takes it all calmly, waits until Travis falls silent, and promptly grounds him.

Yeah, well, screw that.

"You're gonna get in trouble," Hunter says from the other bed. Hunter is ten, and he's only been in the system a few months, so he still follows every rule and keeps his head down to keep from being sent away.

Travis, who pretends like he's long stopped caring about people who will send him away no matter what he does, just scoffs. "I'm going to get in _trouble_ ," he mocks, finishing tying his shoes.

Then he looks up and feels bad, because Hunter's face is twisting like he's about to cry, and he's just a kid, he doesn't deserve to be the focus of Travis's temper.

He softens his tone, musters up a small smile. "Hey, I'll be fine."

Hunter hugs himself and blinks a little too rapidly. "They'll send you away if you get in trouble."

Travis doesn't let his smile falter. "It'll be fine, bud." They'll send him away whether he gets in trouble or not, he's learned that lesson after sixteen years, so he might as well stop worrying about it. "I'll be back before anyone even knows I'm gone."

The boy bites his lip and doesn't say anything. Travis sighs and moves away from the window. "Alright, come on, lay down." He tucks Hunter in, gives him a gentle ruffle of his hair. "Go to sleep. I'll be back before you know it."

He returns to the window, swinging his legs over. He can feel Hunter's eyes on his back, most definitely _not_ sleeping like Travis told him to. Travis doesn't pause, just shimmies out the window and reaches for the branches of the tree in the yard. If Hunter is going to rat him out to Andre, there's nothing Travis can do about it. And if not, well, awesome. But for now, it means he can just get out for a few hours.

He scurries down the tree, landing light on his feet. He pauses in the shadows for a minute, watching the house, as though his foster parents will somehow just _know_ , simply because he's moved out of proximity or something. But the house stays dark, and nothing stirs.

Smirking to himself, Travis tucks his hands in his pockets and strolls down the street. He waits until he's at least a block away before he starts whistling to himself, an extra little bounce in his step. It may only be for a few hours, but right now, he's _free_ , and he's gonna make the most of it.

 **XXXX**

2.

Someone shouts, "Cops!" and drunken college kids scatter like rats. Plates of food are abandoned, and kegs are quickly hidden inside cabinets and behind couches and under tarps, though the proof of their existence is apparent in the dozens of red cups on the ground and the confused panic of drunken kids towards the front door.

Travis knows in an instant he's not getting out that way.

"Aw, hell," he grumbles, heading for the stairs. His roommate spots him and weaves a path in his direction.

"I blame you for this," Travis growls at Derek, fighting the tide surging down the stairs. "I have an exam tomorrow, I can't risk getting caught by the cops. It'll be fun, you said. Just stay for a bit."

"You did have fun," Derek slurs, hanging onto the rail as he pulls himself up the stairs. He drank many more little red cups of alcohol than Travis did. "I saw you with that redhead earlier."

That redhead, Melissa. She'd been at the party with a friend, and she'd looked smoking in white shorts and a jazzy blue-and-gold halter top. She'd also been happy to make out with Travis until they were both dizzy.

"Not worth getting arrested," he calls back, reaching the landing. It's mostly quiet up here. Pretty much everyone's fled downstairs, and anyone who's left is hiding, hoping the campus police won't do a sweep. Fat chance of that.

Travis heads for the back of the house, theoretically as far from the cops as possible. Derek trails on his heels.

Flinging open the door, Travis strides into a bedroom, heading straight for the window. He pulls it open, checking for cops, but the coast is clear. Satisfied, he slings his leg over the sill. Hopefully, since he spent more time making out with Melissa than drinking, he won't land wrong and break his leg.

"Whoa, man, what are you doing?"

Travis glances at his roommate in the doorway. "Getting out of here. You coming?"

Derek shakes his head, backing into the hall. "No way, man."

Travis shrugs. "Your loss. Have fun with the cops." He swings his other leg over the sill, gauging the distance. There's a scrubby patch of—well, _bushes_ is a strong word, but they're green-ish and sort of leafy, so they should be enough to break his fall. Just barely.

He doesn't let himself hesitate or think about it too much. He just tips over the edge and down the wall.

The scrubby hardly-qualifies-as-bushes catch him. It hurts, and he's gonna have a nice collection of bruises in the morning, but he's pretty sure he didn't break anything.

Carefully keeping an eye out for cops, Travis climbs to his feet, wincing as he staggers off into the night.

He finds out later that Derek was caught, hiding in a linen closet. It puts his roommate in a foul mood, and all Travis can do is shrug. "I tried to tell you, man."

Derek scowls at him, and gives him the silent treatment until Friday night, when he says, "Hey, man, you wanna go to a party tomorrow night?"

 **XXXX**

3.

"Oh no." Travis pats his pockets in growing horror. "Come on, this cannot be happening." He checks and double-checks, both jean and jacket pockets, but his keys are nowhere to be seen.

He kicks the door, but that just makes his toe hurt. Groaning, he drops his forehead against the painted wood. "I can't believe this." He could have sworn he had them, but he most definitely doesn't now. Best case scenario, he just left them in the apartment. Worst case, he dropped them while he was out and he'll have to backtrack his entire day—or pay the landlord twenty bucks for a replacement. He's not sure which is worse.

Without much hope, Travis knocks. Nothing happens. His roommates, two buddies from college who helped get this place until they all found something better, both work during the day, and won't be home for hours.

He groans again, thunking his head by the cheap brass numbers on the door. He definitely doesn't want to go backtrack his entire day before checking for his keys inside, because knowing his luck they're right on the counter.

Unfortunately, their neighbors are not the friendly sort one gives ones keys to, and he and his roommates decided against giving spares out, in case they came back and all their stuff was gone.

Which really leaves just one option.

He hits his head one more time for good measure. "I hate my life." Sighing, he pushes off the door and heads for the stairwell, heading down and out the building. He ducks down the alley, and with the help of a conveniently-placed dumpster, hauls himself up onto the fire escape.

Travis looks at the rickety ladder above him, and thinks about his fifth-floor apartment, and he groans again. "I really hate my life."

He starts climbing.

At the third floor he curses himself for forgetting his keys. At the fourth floor, he curses his roommates for picking the fifth-floor apartment instead of the equally nice, if lacking a second bathroom, second-floor apartment they'd toured. By the time he reaches the fifth floor, he's vowed that his next place will be on the ground floor. No higher than the second floor at least.

His apartment is the seventh down the hall, so of course the fire escape is nowhere near it. It's a good thing he's not afraid of heights, Travis thinks, inching out onto the foot-wide decorative ledge that wraps around the building. That doesn't meant he makes a point of looking down, but it's better than being petrified.

After a heart-stopping, death-defying five minutes, he makes it to his window. It's a second's work with his pocketknife to unlatch it and another second to climb inside. Having solid floor under his feet is almost a relief.

His keys are on the kitchen counter, just like he hoped. Which made the risk of climbing totally worth it. Grinning to himself, he spins his keys on his finger, heading for his room.

Ten minutes later, a knock sounds on the door. He comes out, thinking that maybe one of his roommates left behind their keys too. Or maybe it's one of their neighbors, wanting something Travis probably won't let them have because they're all untrustworthy. He swings open the door, a greeting on his lips that dies when he sees his guests.

The two uniformed cops give him a cold, stern looks. "Do you live here?" one of them asks.

"Yes," Travis says slowly. "Is there a problem?"

"We got a call that someone had broken into an apartment on this floor," the cop says. "A witness said someone broke in through the window."

Travis sighs. "It was Mrs. Winkleburg in the next building, wasn't it? Man, that woman's had it out for me ever since I said her dog looks like a dirty dustmop."

Neither cop reacts to this genius comparison. If they'd seen Mrs. Winkleberg's dog, they would understand. "Can we come in?"

It takes over half an hour, a thorough search of the apartment, and the arrival of one of his roommates before the cops are satisfied. With half-hearted apologies lacking any sincerity, the cops leave. Travis immediately goes to the window and flips Mrs. Winkleberg off. Even if she's not watching. The old crone.

"I have _got_ to get my own place."

Travis locks himself out three more times and flat-out loses his keys once. Each time he climbs through the window, the cops get called.

At the end of their lease, Travis is fed-up with apartment living, so when his foster brother's friend says he's got this trailer he's trying to sell, Travis jumps on the offer.

 **XXXX**

4.

One second he's about to have a _really_ nice night with Jaeda, the next, he's being unceremoniously shoved into the closet. A second later, his clothes follow suit, including his leather jacket which hits him right in the face.

The front door opens, the low rumble of a man's voice calls a greeting. Clutching his clothes to his chest, Travis rolls his eyes toward the ceiling. _Seriously?_

He'd met Jaeda at the Romp, the sort of club-slash-bar that panders to short-term relationships of the one night variety. He'd been looking for a good time and she'd been sending out signals. He'd gone over and offered to buy her a drink, and she'd given him a slow smile and invited him to sit.

They'd talked for forty-five minutes, flirting and innuendo liberally mixed in with typical getting-to-know-you chatter, before she not-so-subtly said she wanted to get out of here. And Travis, well, he wasn't one to turn down a pretty, willing woman's company.

They'd taken a cab to her place and headed immediately for the bedroom, shedding clothes as they made out. And it was looking to be a really spectacular night.

Which was when Travis, and his clothes, found himself tucked into Jaeda's closet like a spare set of shoes.

Trying to make as little noise as possible, Travis begins dressing. _Why does this keep happening?_ he bemoans silently, shrugging into his shirt. _Do I just have a face that says 'Come cheat with me'?_ Travis knows he's considered a ladies' man—and there's no denying he's got his charms—but he's not a cheater. He's more of a serial monogamist than anything. He wouldn't have gone there with Jaeda if she'd mentioned a boyfriend.

He freezes as Jaeda and her boyfriend's voice move into the bedroom, balanced precariously with one leg in his pants.

"I missed you, baby," the man says, follow by the sounds of heavy kissing. Travis grimaces and eases into his pants, slow as a snail. He's almost afraid to breathe.

After just about forever, Jaeda's breathless voice says, "I missed you too. How 'bout you go wash up, and then we can _really_ celebrate your early return?"

"Sounds like a plan," the man rumbles. More heavy kissing commences, then the click of a door.

Travis has one foot shoved into his boot when the closet doors are yanked open. For a half-second Travis is afraid it's the boyfriend, come to beat him to a pulp, but it's only Jaeda. "Sorry," she whispers, ushering him out.

He shoves his other foot in his boot, forgoing the laces for the moment. "You didn't think to mention you have a boyfriend?" he hisses.

She looks apologetic. "He wasn't supposed to be back until tomorrow." Like that makes this better, like it all would have been okay, he wouldn't have even been bothered if he'd left tomorrow without knowing.

"Yeah, well—"

The bathroom door opens. Jaeda's eyes go comically wide. "Out the window!" she whisper-yells, pushing him. "Go, go! He can't find you here!"

The urgency in her voice spurs him on. They both fumble to unlock it—Travis is about ready to jump right through the glass by the time it pops open. He wriggles through the tiny gap, and Jaeda slams the window shut again, just barely missing his fingertips as he dangles on the ledge.

He cautiously makes his way to the drainpipe, climbing down in a matter of moments. He goes half a block before he stops to tie his boots, just in case Jaeda's boyfriend happens to glance out the window and wonders why there's a man in an odd state of undress tying his shoes.

When he's done, he stops, looking back at the lit apartment window. Then he shakes his head with a sigh, shoving his hands in his pockets, and he heads home.

It's not the first window he's crawled through because his prospective partner for the night lied/fibbed/forgot to mention they were in a relationship already. Unfortunately, he knows it won't be his last either.

 **XXXX**

5.

Paekman's doorman is a dick.

Like, for one, who even needs a doorman? This isn't that high-class of a neighborhood, but there's a bona fide doorman in the lobby, guarding against all unwelcome presences and checking packages and shit. How pretentious is that? The super probably pulled out his uniform from the eighties and gave himself the job.

A job which entitles him to be a complete _dick_ , apparently.

"What do you _mean_ I can't come in?" Travis leans heavily on the counter, scowling fiercely. The expression is either amplified or completely nullified by the alcohol in his system, but the doorman is totally blank-danced and unresponsive so Travis isn't quite sure what his own face is doing.

The doorman doesn't let Travis's clear confusion or compromised state of affairs keep him from being a complete asshole. "You can't come in," he repeats, chin tilting up microscopically as he looks at Travis.

Travis recognizes that look. It's a look he's seen his entire life, almost every day for as long as he can remember. Because he's an orphan, because he's a foster kid, because he's black. It's a look that says _You aren't welcome here, and I am better than you._

It's a look that says _You have no power here_ , and Travis _so damn tired_ of seeing that look on people's faces.

He straightens as much as he can, ignoring the way the many pints of beer send things tilting at funny angles. "Why the hell _not?_ "

"You are drunk," the man says, and his voice is carefully polite but his eyes say _I do not like or approve of you, and now I finally have a reason to turn you away._

Travis holds up his hand, thumb and forefinger pressed together. "Only a little."

"You are causing a disturbance," the doorman says, which is a load of shit because it's ten at night and there's no one in the lobby at all. But the man just stares levelly at him, unyielding as steel. "You may come back when you are sober."

"Are you serious?" Travis sways against the counter, waving in the vague direction of the elevator. "Just call Paekman up! He'll vouch for me!"

The doorman makes no move to do such a thing. "You are not a tenant here, and it is within my power to remove you from the premises. Please leave."

Travis scoffs and heads for the elevator. "I'd like to see you try."

As it turns out, there are a couple of security guards called up to helpfully escort Travis from the building. Probably the doorman's idiot sons. Travis curses from the sidewalk, flipping the entire building the bird. Stupid racist asshole and his stupid asshole security.

Cursing under his breath (and maybe not so under his breath, he has no idea, he's _really_ drunk) Travis stumbles down the sidewalk. It's a long walk to his trailer-in-a-warehouse; that's why he came to Paekman's in the _first_ place.

His hand slips off the wall, and Travis almost falls flat on his face. Grumbling some more, Travis glares down the side of the building. Dammit, he can _see_ Paekman's window from here—or the window he's like 87% sure is Paekmans window, which is practically the same thing. The light is on and everything. If only he could get up there, he knows Paekman would let him borrow his couch, the same way Travis would if his warehouse-clad-trailer was anywhere near any bars.

Travis wanders down the alley, staring up at the square of light above him. If only he could get up there…

It's just a window. Travis has been through a lot of them in his life.

He rolls his sleeves up, takes a breath, and starts climbing.

It's like climbing a cliff. Every inch is fraught with danger; it makes him grin, adrenaline surging. Haha, _hah_ , this will show that bastard in the lobby downstairs. Watch his face when Travis comes strolling out in the morning, it's gonna be _priceless_.

It's probably gonna look like Paekman's face's face when Travis clumsily scrambles through the window; stunned and incredulous and a little like he just got sucker-punched. It's gonna be an _awesome_ look on that asshole doorman's face.

"Travis?" Paekman scrambles to help him up from where he'd so gracefully fallen on his face. Somehow, with the booze in his brain, he forgot that the window is three feet above ground. And also, thanks to the booze, he forgot to catch himself.

His best bud helps him to his feet. "Travis, what the hell?"

Travis grins, listing against his friend. "Oh man, it's gonna be _awesome_."

That dickwad doorman won't know what hit him.

 **XXXX**

+1.

It takes an extra forty minutes to find Paekman's new apartment building, because Travis has only been here like twice, okay, and one of those times he was too busy hauling a couch up three flights of stairs to worry about which building he was standing in.

Also, he's drunk, so, you know, that doesn't help.

But he finds the building. At least, he's pretty sure it's this building. He remembers the ugly bush things at the front, so unless that's a common feature on buildings along this street, he's pretty sure he's good.

Humming tunelessly to himself, Travis staggers down the tiny alley alongside the building. It's a nice alley. Not a lot of windows. Travis appreciates that sort of thing. Makes climbing into windows so much easier if there aren't a bunch of pesky neighbors peeking out and calling the cops. Travis has had enough cops called on him in his life.

 _You could just go through the front door,_ that little, sensible voice in his head tells him. Travis ignores that voice, because it is a silly voice that tells him things like _Don't go so fast on your motorcycle_ and _Maybe picking this fight isn't such a good idea_ and who needs stupid advice like that? Travis lives on the edge and that's how he likes it.

Besides, he can't remember if Paekman's new apartment has a doorman or not, and after dealing with the asshole at Paekman's last place, Travis isn't going to risk it. So the window it is!

He makes it to the corner of the building, clutching the drainpipe and staring up and up and up. Three stories, Travis remembers that much, and it was a corner apartment, so this must be the one. Huh. The window is dark, but that really isn't much of a deterrent at all. Paekman is his bud, he'll happily let Travis stay the night.

It looks a lot higher from the ground then it did when he was up in the apartment, but Travis blames the alcohol and grips the drainpipe a little more firmly. He's climbed worse windows. He takes a moment, breathes in a lungful of lovely city smog, and starts climbing.

It takes a bit longer than it normally would, because Travis may have done this before but the booze definitely slows things down a little, and the last thing he needs is to go too fast, lose his grip, and fall three stories to break his skull in the alley below. That would be a crappy way to die. No, as fast-lived as Travis is, slow and steady, in this case at least, is definitely the winning combination here.

And look, he made it all the way to the third story without falling and breaking anything, so it was definitely a good idea not to rush. Oh yeah. Travis pauses a moment to congratulate himself before beginning the act of actually breaking into Paekman's apartment, because hell yeah, he's awesome.

And hey, when did Paekman get window boxes?

 **OOOO**

 **The continuing adventures of my shameless self-indulgence series! Yaaay!**

 **This fic originally wasn't going to happen. But then I thought about it, and I realized that the Travis in this series climbs through Wes's window all the time for a** _ **reason**_ **, because that kind of behavior doesn't just happen overnight, and I kind of wanted to explore that. So I came up with some scenarios for why this version of Travis would climb through windows rather than going through a door, including both entrances and exits. And here we are.**

 **Anyway, it's ridiculous and I love it, so there you go. Let me know what you think. Reviews, comments, and constructive criticism are always welcome.**

 **Until next time~!**


End file.
